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Breaking into M.M.A. Training Log

154K views 2K replies 38 participants last post by  KevinD 
#1 · (Edited)
Hello all, I've been mostly lurking these forums for awhile now. A little introduction: I'm 20 years old, just wrapping up doing a little world travel. While I was in Thailand I got involved with a Muay Thai training camp called Tiger Muay Thai, and trained pretty hard for a month and loved it. I decided to see where this passion can take me, and have decided to aim to fight in my first M.M.A. fight at a local amateur venue in my town called Valley Fight this coming December. This means I have a lot of work to do.

I will be training at a local M.M.A. gym called Revolution Chilliwack, as well as training with my friend who also wants to fight within the year.

I'm 20 years old, Southpaw, 6'4 about 195lbs, muscular build from years of weightlifting (I've got an enormous journal on a bodybuilding website but alas, there's no point talking M.M.A. on a bodybuilding forum, so here I am) but relatively weak cardio, other weaknesses include an occassional occurence of shin splints and contact lenses. I've only trained Muay Thai for a month and that's basically all my training besides a bit of self taught boxing.

I'm wrapping up my travels now, sitting in Bangkok for a few more days. I checked out a nearby Muay Thai gym but it was a hole in the ground with some mats and wasn't cheap, so **** it. I'm doing bodyweight exercises and shadowboxing in my room to help maintain what I can.

I go home soon so training resumes on August 1st as I enroll in the MMA gym back home and in addition begin my own training with a partner to keep the total training time to about 3.5 hours a day, 5 days a week.

Training is 4 weeks on followed by 1 week rest, each week is 5 days training, alternating between 2 days set out like this:

Day 1 - Technique
Stretch
Shadowboxing
Hit Pads
Standup Sparring
Rolling
Stretch
Go to class

Day 2 - Conditioning
Stretch
Skipping
Weight Training (Divided into Push/Pull/Leg days focusing on functional strength, explosive power, and endurance.)
Heavy Bag
Speed Bag
Stretch
Go to class

Classes are as follows:
Mon - Beginner Jiu-Jitsu
Tue - M.M.A.
Wed - Beginner Jiu-Jitsu
Thur - Boxing + Muay Thai
Fri - Boxing + Muay Thai + M.M.A
Sat - Rest
Sun - Rest

Going to ease myself into it and build momentum; first week just go to the classes, second week go to the classes and do training every second day, then by the third I'm doing the full routine. Also going to start light on my weights and build momentum over the weeks as powerlifters do.

I've also wrote up a flexible diet that I believe I can maintain pretty easily. I'll add the details once I've gone through with it for awhile in case any changes need to be made. What's important is the 6000 mostly healthy calories to exceed my maintenance level for a gradual weight gain.

Supplements are Protein/Creatine Monohydrate/Multivitamin/Fish Oil, considering a pre-workout supp like N.O. Xplode but don't really need the extra hit to the wallet or a caffeine dependency, so we'll see on that one.

I picked up all my gear to train out here in Thailand for nice and cheap. Got 16oz gloves, shin guards, wraps, mouth guard, and headgear. My friend has bought all of these things as well as some Thai kicking pads and a round timer, so we're all equipped and ready to go.

I'm aiming for December for my premier amateur M.M.A. bout. Wish me luck and feel free to pass on advice. I'm gonna tear a hole into this guy. :thumb02:

Some relevant links
Tiger Muay Thai, Phuket, Thailand:http://www.tigermuaythai.com
Revolution Chilliwack, Chilliwack, Canada:http://www.revolutionfightteam.com
Valley Fight, Chilliwack, Canada:http://www.valleyfight.com
 
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#626 ·
Brazilian Class

Warmup, Gordo's technique was an arm triangle. Set it up from side control as they're using their far arm to cross face you. Move the crossface aside and push your head into it nice and tight. Lock it up at the bicep, transfer to mount, then to the other side control. Then switch your arm triangle to a 'arms crossed' type of position. I wasn't sure about this at first but when he did it to me, it felt like my head was going to pop off, so I'll work with that.

We drilled escapes from side control in which I got dominated and submitted by a blue and two or three brown belts. In rolling I had a great round with a brown but definitely lost, I got to practice my tapping today. I got a round with a smaller purple and I believe he tapped me with something and I got him with an armbar from mounted triangle. Good class.

I've been so ultra lazy lately. I sleep like 11 hours a day and feel super sleepy all day. I picked up some coffee to combat this. Hopefully I'll snap out of the crazy sleeping in so that I have time to go enjoy the beach and still have energy to train twice a day.
 
#629 ·
Warm up with yesterdays half guard sweeps.

Technique was more from the half guard. First was get underhook, shrimp out bracing off their far knee. Other hand reaches out to grab their belt. Lift your shoulder tight underneath theirs so there's no space. Shoot your body back to clear your head behind their arm, and swing up to take back. Second technique you get the underhook and curl in, then feed their belt end through their legs, reaching around with your other arm and passing it to it. At this point release your half guard, come out and sprawl out against their back with your body, straightening your arm to drive their hips forward. Third technique you get the underhook, pull out the far side of their lapel with your other hand. Feed the lapel to the underhooking hand and keep it tight at the armpit. Gerbil calls this grip the 'insurance policy'. As they pass your half guard, the insurance policy prevents them from turning into you, which allows you to pop your head out and take their back.

I feel mega paced out right now, which makes remembering techniques a bit of a bitch, sometimes when I need it I just go blank. Lame. My sleeping's kind of messed up and I've been waning myself off some medications in the hopes to get off them ASAP, so this will improve shortly. Training tonight.
 
#630 ·
Brazilian Class

Warmup, technique was a choke from when they're turtle in towards you. Left hand feeds their right lapel to the right hand, which reaches in along their neck and grips the lapel with a four finger grip inside. Then your left hand reaches under their armpit, through to cup around the back of their head. Then you gator roll, flatten out onto your belly to finish the choke. Nice choke, hopefully I get the hang of it.

In rolling I did decently, got to roll lots of brazilians today. Had a good back and forth with a blue, got his back and had mount a few times but couldn't finish. Brazilians got sick survival skills. Rolled a fat purple and had lots of back and forth with no submissions. I ended the round mounted on him but have no idea who would have won on points. Then a purple that was ******* crazy good and was all over me with shit. He tapped me a couple times with a variety of shit. My largest offence was when he was doing a step over to take mount, I shielded up with my knee/elbow and the knee drove hard and direct into his balls. I literally felt everything crush under the force of my knee until I hit pelvic bone. Ouch. I think I got the message through that I was sorry. I guess people don't wear cups out here. I've noticed very few even wear mouthguards.

My body's getting a good ache going now. I've been increasing my training frequency slowly but surely.

Optimistically I'd like to get to the 10:30 am No Gi class to try that out. I hear its an absolute slaughtering, with the majority of the participants being black belts. I will put forth a medium effort to make it to this class tomorrow. I need to start branching out my training because rotating two and a half gis and doing jiu jitsu twice a day when you're the sweatiest motherfucker in brazil, whilst sharing one washing machine between 12-15 people, is very difficult.
 
#631 ·
****** Class

Warmup with half guard sweeps. New technique was from half guard if you can't get the underhook. Bridge and reach out to get the underhook as usual, but this time their head is tight and there's too much pressure to sneak the elbow in. Instead use that arm to grip at their upper back/shoulder, bring the knee of your inside leg out and over their thigh to brace off for space. Put your half guard into the inside of their legs. Banana your back to create space to reguard. Second technique works of this, instead of reguarding you push off their face and move into an omoplata. Once that arm is trapped, knees stay tight, the far arm reaches over to grab their belt right away to prevent them from rolling. Other hand braces at their nearest leg as you scoot your hips away to flatten them out. Gerbils variation for finishing the omoplata is to reach both hands around their fair shoulder, pulling on it as you lift your hips up and drive your knees to the floor. I actually think I might execute an omoplata one day...I usually only get a sweep with it on a very rare occasion.

As predicted I didn't roll today. My knees are killing me. I might go in today to hit the bag though.

Looking forward to another Brazilian BBQ tonight to see Jonathon off, he's a purple belt from the states that has been out here for a few months. He has a big bottle of Jack Daniels that he might need some help getting through tonight =). And then maybe after that I'll head off for some drinks with Isabel... ;) This Saturday Gordo's taking us to hike up that mountain I posted a couple pages back, then I get to watch my first UFC PPV in Brazil. I'm pulling for Carwin, btw. I think there's another Brazil soccer game sometime this weekend too. So I'll take some pics and hopefully have a funny story or two by the end of the weekend.
 
#632 ·
Today we had to go register for IBJFF or whatever the acronym is so that we can compete in the Rio open this month. That was a bit of a pain in the ass, and we had to cancel the ****** class to get it done.


Brazilian Class

Warm up, technique was omoplata from spiderguard. I'm not going to lie, I'm a bit too lazy to go through it.

In rolling I put up a good struggle but got collar choked twice by a big brown belt. I also sat in my half guard with a blue belt that was pretty much a stalemate...I'm frustrated that my bottom half guard is so weak. I beat a white belt but I was quite a bit bigger than him.

Today I saw a brown belt choke another brown belt unconscious, pretty intense. Yesterday we got a new guy in who'll be a great training partner for me. Blue belt, 6'5 and 200+ lbs. It's great because most of the guys out here are smaller, and all the bigger guys out here are brown belt or higher.

Tomorrow is open mats. I'm going to go in and hit the heavybag for the first time in like a month. I don't think I'll get much of a chance to work on my striking out here, but I'll do my best to keep what I have and focus on making the BJJ soar.
 
#633 ·
Went in to hit the bag for the first time in forever. Did 5 3 minute rounds.

I got in a few more sessions this week than last, and I will try to step it up further next week. Tomorrow we have that huge mountain hike to do, so theres really no days off in sight. I'm thinking that I'll alternate between doing burpees and hitting the bag every morning. Well see as we go.

I'm also going to attempt to watch an hour every of BJJ instructional everyday on my own time. This is me making myself accountable for it. Today is Saulo's Half Guard from BJJ Revolution 1.
 
#634 ·
We hiked up Pedra da Gavea today with Gordo and a bunch of us from the house. It's that mountain right behind our house that I posted earlier. Must have been 6-8 hours of a hike...started off at a strong incline but a few hours in it turned into some freestyle rockclimbing. Sketchy stuff, especially in skate shoes with no equipment, but I think I picked up a new hobby...the view from the top was incredible.



Heading out with the crew, this is the street our house is on








View from the top of Pedra da Gavea

 
#638 ·
****** class.

Warmup with half guard sweep. Technique was from the guard.

1. Scissor sweep. Instead of going over it, I'll just note Jeremy's details. The knee going across his hips is lifting diagonally. Up and across as oppossed to just across. The leg chopping is lifted off the ground, as opposed to sliding along it to help prevent them from getting over it. The shoulder with the collar grip is close to their face, posting high off the other elbow, as you do the sweep, you are keeping your elbow bent and shoulder high, rocking your body back with momentum and then scissoring. The scissor sweep only works when they're driving forward...when they're posturing we go to the next one.

2. Scissor sweep but kicking the leg out instead. The setup is different in that the sleeve grip is being held as you twist your whole body, chest to the ground. Then instead of chopping at the leg you kick out at the knee.

3. This one goes off when you banana your body out and go to kick but they have enough space to walk around to the side. If you had proper position with your chest to the mat, you can drive the elbow with the collar grip high and outwards, while pulling with the sleeve grip outwards to subdue them enough to get to your knee and possibly drive them over.

4. A standup from scissor sweep position. Instead of having your knee completely across their hips, the knee rests on the hip and the foot on the floor. Other foot is on their other hip. Hand on the sleeve posts on the floor, foot on the hip pushes off and circles out to do a technical standup. Instead of standing all the way up you stay semi crouched and get your chest on their back fast, spinning around to the back.

In rolling today we started from a stand to prepare for the tournament. I had some good back and forths. Lost to a blue and beat a blue, both positionally. Beat two white belts positionally. Rolled Gerbil and managed a guard pull and even a trip but I always ended up on the bottom before long. I tapped to something that started as a triangle that turned into an armbar that turned into a wrist lock that I tapped to. lol. I also got keylocked from my half guard. Good roll though.

I feel kind of sick today. My throats all pleghmy and I had an upset stomach and almost passed out after class today. Might be because I hadn't eaten much of anything.

I got groceries finally which was long overdue...and as I was looking at something in the aisle I look up and there's two girls that work there watching me. I continue past them and then there's two guys that work there also watching me. As I go to pass them one of them has a big smile and says "Thank you!" I'm like "uhhh...thank me?" Keep in mind pretty much nobody speaks english out here. He has a sparkle in his eye. The gay sparkle. You know what I'm talking about. He pets my arm and says "Thank you...you are beautiful". lmao. Not one to be out awkwarded, I embraced it with a "AWW! Thank you!!" smiled and carried on.

Anyone interested in what I typically eat in Brazil, here's a breakdown.

Wake up - Protein shake with milk
Pre workout - Some brazilian super fibre cereal with milk, cup of coffee
Post workout - Protein shake with milk
Afternoon - Cottage cheese, yogurt, kiwi, banana, granola all mixed together
Post workout #2- Protein shake with milk
Dinner - I go out to various restaurants once a day for dinner. Every meal usually comes with rice and bean sauce, then I'll usually get chicken breast and steamed vegetables. If I don't go out I whip up some whole wheat penne and tomato sauce.
Pre sleep - Protein shake

Various snacks throughout the day - peanuts, cashews, acai....and beer.

Often the protein shake is actually some shitty meal replacement type powder you find at grocery stores. I recently got my hands on some protein powder from a guy that wasn't going to use it though, so I'm happy about that.

The Rio open tournament's in less than 3 weeks. I need to lose some weight. I'm at 98kg and need to hit 94.3kg, so I'll tighten up my diet and stop drinking beer. Okay...I might have some beer on wednesday because Isabel wants me to go karaoking with her, and I need some liquid confidence... but other than that no beer.
 
#639 · (Edited)
about how much vegetables are you eating, would you say? I'm very lazy about preparing them and my family will hardly ever eat them.

More particularly, I"m curious about which vegetables provide the most nutritional bang for the buck. I was amazed the other day that the icky broccoli slaw I was eating didn't have a ton more fiber, for example.

Why is decent protein powder so hard to come by there?

Can't wait to see pictures of the albino Bigfoot at karaoke charming straight women and gay dudes alike. I'm astonished that more people don't speak English there, esp. with all the tourism.
 
#641 ·
I don't get a lot of veggies right now. I'm making the most of the amazingly tasty and cheap fruit they have out here instead. I have steamed veggies usually with my dinner which is carrots, zucchini, and some weird green vegetable that I haven't been able to identify. My multivitamin has greens in it too, so that helps a bit. As for as nutritional info though, I remember reading the darker the veggie the more nutrient dense it is. I don't really know, I'm no expert on the subject.

Protein powder is horrendously expensive because there's huge tarriffs (I think it's literally taxed at 100% of the value) on anything imported out here. Store price protein out here is 5-6 times what I pay to order my stuff online back home. Running shoes is another amusing oddity. Apparently a pair of Nikes will run you $200-300 U.S. They literally sell their shoes with payment plans. Crazy.

No pics of Karaoke...I keep forgetting to buy more batteries for my camera. Most of the debauchery that took place last night really shouldn't be put on the internet anyway.
 
#640 ·
Internet went down for like 3 days so I'll do some catchup.

****** Class

Warmup with scissor sweep and its alternative. Techniques today were kimura from guard and the traditional hip bump sweep, both of which I don't need to go over. Then we also did a hip bump sweep that we use when they're leaning more forwards...reach with one arm under their nearest hand to grip the sleeve of the further away hand. The sweep is less technical and more of a sneaky move, it's meant to be done with your back flat on the mat, get the grip, and then explode fast, keeping our hips lower than a typical hip bump sweep and turning your chest to the mat for momentum. Then after that we did another hip bump sweep variant that's somewhere inbetween the height of the traditional hip bump and the low one. The grip for this one is reaching across and cupping the back of their elbow. There's lots of things you can do with this grip, so they shouldn't know you're hip bumping until they're being hit with it. Gerbil also showed us to have a collar grip, then reach over to the other collar to threaten the choke, then cup the elbow and hip bump sweep. I'll work on these variants because the hip bump used to be my bread and butter but is almost impossible to land out here. Did decently in rolling.



Brazilian Class

Typical warmup. Technique was from the butterfly guard. Taking the back and rolling to mount. The back take from butterfly is to take one underhook and hold at the belt, lifting high at the elbow. Other hand grips their other sleeve and pulls it in. Shrimp out to the underhook side, popping your head out the back of the underhooked armpit, using the belt grip pull up to put hooks in. The mount take from butterfly guard starts gripping at the pant legs outside their knees, pull them deeper into the butterfly guard to get some lift. Then once again underhook a side at the belt, and again trapping the other sleeve and pulling in. Then use the feet to lift, driving the underhooked elbow and the corresponding leg up high as you pull on the other side. My butterfly guard sucks, but I'm going to make a note to try these the next time I get to roll with a white belt. We drilled from the open guard where the bottom is trying to sweep and the top is trying to pass. I got paired up with a good sized Brazilian blue and swept him once with the kick the knee out variant of the scissor sweep. He didn't pass me =)

In rolling I rolled Gerbil and definitely tapped at least once, don't recall what. I give him some resistance at least. Same with Dennis, the black belt that runs the house for us here. He got me with a collar choke from his half guard that frustrated me a bit. He also got me in an armbar from mount but gave me shit for tapping before it was extended. He'd rather I try the escape, which felt pretty pointless when a black belt has your your naked arm in an armbar, but I'll at least attempt a last ditch escape next time. Also got to roll with Raphael, the Brazilian purple that's supposed to be a brown, the one I described as akin to Jacare earlier. I gave him a good positional fight but he eventually got on my back. I defended well for a minute or two but eventually succumbed to a bow and arrow choke. Near the end of the round I actually passed his guard with a tackle pass, and basically had him mounted, with just one ankle trapped when the time was up. I think I'm slowly getting more resiliant to the onslaught...good class. I got to watch Dennis tap another black belt with a twister.

I weighed myself with my lighter gi on today and I'm 2 kilos over my weight class. Everyone went out to Burger King, which is ******* awesome in Brazil by the way, and I'm here alone eating whole wheat pasta. I put some icy hot type stuff on a few joints directly after showering after class tonight...BAD IDEA. I don't know if it's the sun I got today, or that I had just finished BJJ class and my sweat pores were open, but it felt like chemical burns all over my body. I'll wait next time. I'm a bit behind on my DVD watching...I watched Saulo's half guard, and half of side control. I'll finish the side control and
get started on the guard one tonight.


****** Class

Warmup with scissor and hip bump sweeps. Techniques today were based around the armbar from guard. The basic armbar, same side arm grabs the arm you're attacking at the sleeve, far arm feeds under their other arm and clamps at the elbow of arm you are attacking. Same side foot as the arm you're attacking goes to their hip, knee tight to their shoulder. Bridge up with the hips, then bring your other leg up and around the corner of their shoulder. A hand pushes against the side of their face to lift the first leg from the hip to the side of their head. Don't cross you're feet or Gerbil will have you doing pushups. From there we learned the stack defense. The free hand reaches under the arm being attacked, palm down on their far shoulder. Closest knee goes the the side of the head, the other leg pops up to a foot and stays tight to their butt. The free arm that is on their shoulder grabs at their knee, driving your shoulder down and your elbow into their throat. Using only your arm and not torquing the rest of your body, slowly yank the threatened arm free in small jerking motions. Once free, that hand goes to the knee while the other drives through their legs to flatten them out into side control. We drilled these all class. I wasn't going to roll but Gerbil wanted to film himself doing some rounds so I volunteered to do one. I got to practice swallowing my ego as he swept me and tapped me with a collar choke from half guard in like 20 seconds. Awesome. It sucks, but at least one of my biggest weaknesses isn't really applicable in MMA. Another downside is that somehow in my shortlived roll with Gerbil today I hurt my ******* shoulder again. It was just starting to feel strong again, but there it goes. I'll nurse it tonight, unsure if I'm doing the Brazilian class. I'll end the entry on a high note, I somehow lost like two kilos over night and am right on target for the tournament. Need to be 94.3 kilos and I was 94.2.


Brazilian Class

Missed ****** class today...we had a late one last night and a long commute back to the house this morning. Karaoke was good. Didn't get a chance to sing because the line up to get one stage was huge but had a good time anyways. Imagine the karaoke room in Lost in Translation but pack 100 Brazilians into the room. Fun stuff.

Warmup. Technique was a sweep from spider guard. Basically just lifting at one arm, and chopping at the knee ala a scissor sweep with your other leg to roll to mount. We did guard pass drills starting from spider guard and I got ******* owned. For example, in the first ten seconds a black belt almost swept me, but I managed to balance out and then he was in a belly down armbar. I almost passed a brown belts guard but no such luck. In rolling I just rolled Gerbil who could have kimurad me but showed mercy because he knows my shoulder is messed. Other than that I managed to survive the round with him. Good class.
 
#642 · (Edited)
****** Class

Technique was arm drags. First from a stand just to get the idea. Jeremy's arm drags are different in that he pushes the wrist into their body as he steps through, instead of just yanking the sleeve.

From guard we did the same arm drag when they're doing the pant leg grip, just kick out the gripped leg and arm drag into them into the mat. From here you reach around to grip at their back/armpit, you can get a quick submission by basically aligning your other forearm to their arm dragged arm, so that your hand is at their elbow and vice versa and then twisting your elbow out to put pressure on their shoulder. Even if it doesn't tap them it helps push them down to take back.

We also did the same arm drag but of off the double grip at the waist. Ack. My memories kind of shot right now and I can't go over this technique. I didn't grasp it very well today, I just don't seem to have any concentration right now so I'll try to edit it in later. I didn't roll today because my shoulder is giving me warning signs and I'd like to give it a solid weekend of healing. This evening I'm going to do some burpees instead of the Brazilian class.

Remember that stupid MMA tournament that I almost did a few months ago but it had retarded rules? Anyways, I went to watch it with my training partner and was really not impressed with the competitors. They're hosting another one two days after I get home (sept. 15), so we're talking to Kajan about entering into the tournament together, him as a middleweight. I'm absolutely down, but my only concern is that the 20 hours of flying will still be taking its toll on my body. I'm entirely confident that we stand a good chance to both take our respective belts home, winning 6 or so fights between us. My partner's been working hard on his boxing skills in anticipation of getting a boxing fight in the next few months. Let me tell you, his hands were already awesome as it was when I left him to go to Brazil...he's finally getting out to the pro gym for sparring and he's taking off even more. I'm really stoked that he's taking the dive into fighting and that we have a chance for a double night of glory at a venue close to home that all of our friends can come out to. Exciting stuff. I want to get back to training right now just thinking about it. =)
 
#643 ·
Burpees (5x3 minute rounds, 1 min rest)
1 - 33
2 - 27
3 - 25
4 - 23
5 - 22
Total - 130

7 over last time. Gotta get doing these more. I'm going to start setting an alarm clock because I'm oversleeping, which cuts into my ability to train and also makes this vacation fly by faster. No more oversleeping!
 
#644 ·
Weekend.

Saturday a few of us headed to the nearby beach. The weather was medicore so it wasn't the most amazing trip. We made a point of doing a set of chin ups and dips along every workout station as we walked down there, so we got a decent little workout in and got to show off our sweet ****** muscles.

On the way back we encountered a circle of 30 or so people doing Capoeira. I didn't have my camera on me, but it was pretty cool to watch. It was akin to this:


They were clapping out a beat while the leaders were beating drums and various instruments and leading a chant. Inside the circle people of equal rank would pair up, dancing around eachother throwing spinning head kicks and other funky Capoeira moves. Though it's not the most useful of martial arts, I got a shiver down my spine a few times as this general feeling of unity overcame me. Everyone was hugging, smiling, fully immersed into the performance and having a genuinely good time. It's very rare back home that you'd see people drop their ego and just be enthusiastic about a group activity. You certainly don't get that sort of feeling out of anything I train.

Moving along, Saturday night we decided to get really drunk and go to the emporium, the bar that I met Isabel at on my first weekend. It had been awhile since the house as a group went out to do something, and I was especially interested to see the UK guys finally throw down and drink with us....because I know how ******* crazy people from that side of the world behave when they drink. We got pre drinking at the house, and I introduced a beer shotgunning challenge, which proved to be pretty messy. Shotgunning beers is a decisively Canadian sport.



We headed to a bar by our house to continue the festivities. We started to get a little rowdy in the middle of the street, Joe, an indecipherable but charismatic fellow from somewhere around the U.K. (Scotland?), took an underhook on me, I swam in for the underhook and gently suplexed (lol) onto the street, took knee on belly, and started fake ground and pounding while everyone stared at us.

We had the most obnoxious bus ride to Ipanema, the beach that the Emporium bar is on. We took over the bus immediately, screaming and singing various Backstreet Boys and Journey hits in our drunken and overly exaggerated accents. It didn't take long for the Brits to start doing gymnastics in the bus.



Taking a very public piss at our destination. Right next to an extremely unimpressed Brazilian.



The bar was packed as usual. I spent my night running around between our people scattered throughout the bar... wingmanning for my housemates when possible and otherwise being charming/offensive to whatever girls were in range. We met two extremely cute sisters visiting from Sau Paulo. I didn't get a picture with them but if they'll friend me on facebook I'm sure they won't be too offended if I use one of their pictures.



We decided to meet up for the world cup the next day. After they left I got kind of bored and found my bus home.

Watched the World Cup on the beach again. Blah blah blah. Kind of a long game and I got really hungry and there was nowhere to pee, which is apparently a regular issue in Brazil. So that was alright. An eye catching sand sculpture.



Afterwards we met up with those girls, and it was quite clear that my housemates already had developed interests in these girls. We went out for some pizza together and then I got bored of being the fifth wheel and went over to Isabel's place instead. She's leaving for Canada tomorrow, so that's a little disappointing. Our trips overlap and I'm going to see her for a month or so once I get home though.
 
#645 ·
****** class. Warmup with armbars, hip bump sweeps, and arm drag sweeps. I'm actually getting the hang of the arm drag sweeps, which is good news.

Theme for this week is open guard passing. Today we worked on when you're standing and they're sitting on their but, trying to grab a leg to sweep or move to De la Riva. The first move is just to flatten them out. You just grab at both of their ankles from the outside and lift them forcibly in the air, throwing them flat onto their back. From there you can close the distance with one leg pressuring the back of their knee, your elbow connected to your knee and your hands gripping the pants. The three techniques work off of this.

The first, as they flatten you basically sprawl straight down, face into their crotch and underhooking the leg. Yes, this is the eating ***** position. Anyways, from there you gable grip over their stomach, pulling them in towards you as you get to your knees, then pressing forward, stacking them, as you get to your feet. From there it's just a basic wrestler pass, walking your legs around and twisting your shoulders to take side control.

Second technique, after pulling out their ankles, they come back up and get ahold of your leg. You take the underhook on the same side of the trapped knee, and you drive that knee straight on into their chest to flatten them to the mat. The underhook keeps them pinned as you use your knee-on-chest to baseball slide throuh into the scarf hold position in side control.

Third technique, once again they come back up to trap the leg, this time you can't get the underhook. Instead of the underhook, grip at their elbow, and take a grip at the back of their collar with the other hand. Then once again drive that knee, lifting at their elbow. It's necessary to step forwards with your free leg past their guard as you drive with the trapped one. Once flattened out, the knee-on-chest can slide to their armpit to take mount.

We did positional drilling from either end of open guard, did decently, but had a size and experience advantage on my opponents. Brazilian class this evening.
 
#646 ·
Brazilian Class

Warmup, technique was taking mount from side control. In the reverse keta gatame (scarf hold), when your opponent has one leg resting across their other knee to block the mount. Grab the ankle laying across the other knee and push it to the mat, trapping it with your bottom leg. Then thrust with your pelvis (that's what she said) to force them to turn slightly on their side, you want their far knee to be touching the mat. Once they're twisted like this you can do a big step over to take mount in a grapevine. This is a more refined version of how I usually take mount so I should be able to put it to use shortly.

We did guard pass drills with all the browns/blacks starting on the mat. I didn't pass any guards. I almost passed a small black belt's guard, no lies, but he scrambled out in the nick of time.

In rolling I dominated a white belt but took forever to finish him from mount, eventually got an arm triangle though. Then I rolled Raphael, the extremely good purple belt my size and I did decently, only tapping once to a wrist lock in an omoplata. Going to do MMA class tomorrow morning. I promise.
 
#647 ·
Ack. Things have taken a temporary turn for the worst.

Went to my first MMA class and got my ass kicked. I ate alot of ground and pound. That's normally okay but afterwards my stomach was killing me, I figured it was the repeated punching and elbowing and that I might have some internal bruising or something. Anyways, I mustered up the strength to go to BJJ class and felt just awful. We did some more open guard pass techniques. Then I got home and sat in my bed all day feeling ******* terrible. I eventually ended up in the bathroom, blasting out the contents of my body from multiple directions. I think it's food poisoning. I haven't ate in a long time now and am just starting with liquids. Fun stuff. On top of that, the house is over packed with people right now and there's barely any breathing room. Oh and the weather in Rio has gone to shit.
 
#650 ·
Thank **** that's over. What an enormous waste of time that sickness was. I'm itching to get back into the gym. Probably go in early to hit the bag, and do two classes tomorrow. Also get to see how much weight I dropped...estimating 8lbs.

I have the option of doing a 4 hour Rickson Gracie seminar in english this wednesday, but it's $250 US...I'm pretty torn. I can afford it, but I'm by no means rich, and that money would cover many other things...such as at least 4 privates with other black belts out here. I'm also not the most knowledge absorbant of human beings, I have no idea what would stick and what would be right over me. Opinions?
 
#652 ·
Went in early to hit the bag, didn't use a timer just did set numbers. Double jab, 1-3, 1-2, 2-3-2, left round, left push-left round, lead push-superman jab, clinch and knee.

****** class. Warm up with a variety of guard passes. Worked on hook and sickle sweep to knee cup pass, then an armbar. I'll go over the armbar. Once side control is locked, their nearest arm is pushed to the opposite side of the head as if they were being arm triangled. You hold do this with your nearest hand but feed it to your other arm reaching behind their head. Your nearest arm traps their far arm, tucking at the elbow as you move towards north south as if you were going for a kimura, but instead keep going, taking the armbar as you fall of towards their legs, grabbing at their nearest knee to discourage them from rolling away.

We did some drills. One starting in your partner's guard trying to posture as they're trying to break it. Then another with the same except once you establish posture you stand up. Then another starting from side control and moving around to their other side.

In rolling I got a good white belt that pulled guard and gave me a real hard time. I was patient and eventually passed and took mount as the round ended.

Then I got Gerbil but I got to start on his back. First time I made the mistake of body triangling. Ankle locked fast. Second time I held back longer but couldn't really threaten anything. I transferred to mount as he was getting closer to escape, but it was only a matter of time before he got his guard back. Spent alot of time with him sinking a kimura and me making him earn it, but he eventually got it free and tapped me again. When the round ended I was just about to get armbarred.

Rolled a blue, got swept into side control but reversed the position. He eventually got his guard back and kimrad me.

I was feeling good at the start of class but as it wore on I started to feel extremely weak and light headed. It's just the dehydration and I have to suck it up for the time being.

When I got sick I was 95 kilos and dropped to 89. Today I'm 92. My cut off for the tournament on thursday is 94.

I've decided to go to the Rickson Gracie seminar wednesday morning, then the Rio Open is thursday and/or friday for me. I saw an ad for some MMA fights here in Rio...R$15 to get in! That's amazing. That's like 9$US to see MMA fights if you were wondering. So assuming I don't get shanked and robbed I'll have an interesting rest of the week to write about.

Good class. Brazilian Class tonight.
 
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